We Were Soldiers Once, and Young

"Another and far more transcendent love came to us unbidden on the battlefields, as it does on every battlefield in every war man has ever fought. We discovered in that depressing, hellish place, where death was our constant companion, that we loved each other. We killed for each other, we died for each other, and we wept for each other. And in time we came to love each other as brothers. In battle our world shrank to the man on our left and the man on our right and the enemy all around. We held each other’s lives in our hands and we learned to share our fears, our hopes, our dreams as readily as we shared what little else good came our way.

We were the children of the 1950’s and John F. Kennedy’s young stalwarts of the early 1960s. He told the world that Americans would “pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship” in the defense of freedom. We were the down payment on that costly contract, but the man who signed it was not there when we fulfilled his promise. John F. Kennedy waited for us on a hill in Arlington National Cemetery, and in time we came by the thousands to fill those slopes with our white marble markers and to ask on the murmur of the wind if that was truly the future he had envisioned for us.

The class of 1965 came out of the old America, a nation that disappeared forever in the smoke that billowed off the jungle battlegrounds where we fought and bled. The country that sent us off to war was not there to welcome us home. It no longer existed. We answered the call of one president who was now dead; we followed the order of another who would be hounded from office, and haunted, by the war he mismanaged so badly.

Many of our countrymen came to hate the war we fought. Those who hated it the most—the professionally sensitive—were not, in the end, sensitive enough to differentiate between the war and the soldiers who had been ordered to fight it. They hated us as well, and we went to ground in the cross fire, as we had learned in the jungles.

In time our battles were forgotten, our sacrifices were discounted, and both our sanity and our suitability for life in polite American society were publicly questioned. Our young-old faces, chiseled and gaunt from the fever and the heat and the sleepless nights, now stare back at us, lost and damned strangers, frozen in yellowing snapshots packed away in cardboard boxes with our medals and ribbons.

We rebuilt our lives, found jobs or professions, married, raised families, and waited patiently for America to come to it’s senses. As the years passed we searched each other out and found that the half-remembered pride of service was shared by those who had shared everything else with us. With them, and only with them, could we talk about what had really happened over there—what we had seen, what we had done, what we had survived.

We knew what Vietnam had been like, and how we looked and acted and talked and smelled. No one in America did. Hollywood got it wrong every damned time, whetting twisted political knives on the bones of our dead brothers.

So once, just this once. This is how it began, what it was really like, what it meant to us, and what we meant to each other. It was no movie. When it was over the dead did not get up and dust themselves off and walk away. The wounded did not wash away the red and go on with life, unhurt. Those who were miraculously unscratched were by no means untouched. Not one of us left Vietnam the same young man he was when he arrived.

We were soldiers once, and young."

The River and stuff

Last year the Colorado River flooded everything and crested at 21.5 feet deep. This year we didn't get nearly the snow fall in the Rockies so I didn't expect much. There was 15 feet of snow in the Rockies but when the heat finally came to the mountains the snow melted fast and has been rising a foot a day and is up to 15 feet. It's on the edge of letting people go kayaking but it went down a little today so I did. They said it was a workout and looked pretty tired when they got back. We had stairs but at the boat ramp where you could get in the water and board the kayak and then one day we didn't and moved the kayaks up the ramp so they didn't get taken. We lost three of them last year when guests left them at the bottom of the stairs, we had a storm and they were gone.

Love the hikes looking down into the river. Quite a bit of traffic in the river now. Kayaks, canoes, tour boats, but mostly rafts.

I have five kinds of lizards. The smallest are the fence lizards. No point in getting to know them. Everybody eats them. Next are the side-blotched lizards who have been my favorites and own the porches. Have a blueish purplish color on their sides. The males go around doing push ups all the time trying to intimidate others who may think about fighting them. The fights are tragic as they are almost always to the death. When I moved here my bedroom window was always open. I didn't know what was out here but I knew if the crickets stopped chirping it was something they weren't familiar with. Then I notice I had less and less crickets as the year went on. I'd get use to one distinctive cricket then wouldn't hear it again. That's because the whip tail lizards who are two lizards grown together over milions of years and who are all female, they clone themselves, even simulating the act, have sensitive bellies and will lay in the dirt until they feel movement in the ground and dig the cricket up and eat it. Seems like there are the most of the whip tail but life is changing. Over the last month or so I've seen three leopard lizards hang out by the garage and when a whip tail wanders they are taken and swallowed by the leopards. Today though is the first time I've seen a whip tail get taken by a leopard and the leopard ran off with it instead of slowly moving it around and swallowing it. Not long after it was gone I saw three more whip tails over by the garage who seemed to be searching for the missing sister.

Back in March when we had the disc golf tournament 127 competitors, 35 on the waiting list and it sold out in 88 seconds. Last weekend a lot of those that didn't make it had their own tournament.

As the sun moves back up this way the saddle of the shadow moves with it.

Time

Tonight it's Friday May 24th at about 10:40pm. The sky is mostly clouds and there is a breeze. It's beautiful tonight. Teresa fed the critters tonight. I heard her talking to the foxes, raccoons, ringtail, and a skunk or two. I was inside working on scheduing so she volunteered. Tampa shook me up. Every airport, every everything, there were so many people everywhere. I had forgotten about civilation in general. It exists here of course but at such a small scale and I control most of it. It was nice to see friends of the past and as I spoke with each one I was thinking I'll probably never see them again so make the most of this. I don't want to go back out into that world. For years my once or so a week journey was enough for me. Hour to town, hour back, and an hour in town. If it took longer than that I was disappointed that I wasn't spending that time out here.

Jax and I are hiking again since my return but it's limited. Usually by 6:30am I've fed the birds, squirrels, and chipmunks in three locations around the lodge. The hawks that use to hide in wait in the morning rarely come around anymore. I have three prominant pair of ravens who mate for life and over the years they have ganged up and killed most of the hawks to include my frienemy several years ago. I think there are three hawks left. There are more turkey vultures lately but they don't bother the three feeding areas around the lodge. Strangely having not seen a rabbit on this side of the property there is one now and it's seen most mornings running around the lodge. How it survives with the amount of foxes around I don't understand.

Yesterday I had a guests who's vehicle couldn't get up Hurrah so they returned to town and called me when they had service. I told them to drive back towards me and I'll head towards them and when we meet give them a ride back to the lodge. So in the morning I'll be taking them abck out to their vehicle in a side by side. There has always been one corner on the way up Hurrah where biting flies live and there is about a mile of the road where they land on me even when I'm booking on the side by side and bite me. I'll take a fly swatter with me and on the way back when I don't have guests with me I'll stop get bitten a few times but take three or four of them out. The Desert Willow tree has always first bloomed between May 10th and May 14th but last year it was way late and this year two blooms showed up on the morning of the 15th.

The Life Before This One, Hall of Fame

Inside the Tropicana there was an area set up for the three of us to receive our award and give a little speech. When the other two spoke I was referred to as The Godfather of indoor soccer. I was a little ruthless to competitors. I don't think a competitor in any city we went into survived. Gary Archer who I handpicked to replace me when I retired after 20 something years gave a little speech about me before it was my turn. Was emotional. He spoke a little of my life before even this one. He said I was a table tennis champion and I was. I rode competitive trials and helped put on the world championship. Before MMA I fought in karate tournaments. I got kicked out of the US Intermountain in Salt Lake at the Salt Palace for being out of control. My mom was there. Was embarrassing. I fought in the World Championships in Long Beach and while Gary said I kicked Chuck Norris ass, actually I was eliminated in the round before I would have fought Chuck. I wasn't too disappointed as the guy that beat me got sent into the sixth row of metal chairs by Mr. Norris. Seems like there were a couple other things but I'm old and don't remember. Gary said his family had an indoor soccer facility in Tucson and the family had met about closing down. I showed up, wanted to be their partner, we'd share equity, I'd inject money, and show them how to run the place. His fauther retired four years later. He was emotional about it. Gary worked 100 hour weeks like I did, sometimes closer to 120 hour weeks. Lived in the buildings. Total commitment. He was good.

When you pick somebody to replace you usually they are all humble when you hand over the keys but it's not long before they start bad mouthing you because the job they inherited is way more difficult than they thought and blaming you who can't fight back is the best option that it's your fault. Probably 15 years after I handed the job over I met someone inside the company I hadn't seen inside the company in all that time. I ask how Gary was doing and he says Gary tells people to this day he's doing his best to fill some big shoes. I picked the right guy. I spoke briefly and mostly spoke of the hard work it takes and the family of people and Let's Play. This company is almost 40 years old. Companies don't make it to 40 years. This one did because these are the people that are the Haydukers of the indoor soccer world. The ones that have hearts so big they don't fit in their chests.

I got lucky meeting them one at a time and they all made contributions above and beyond. Gary runs the company now and is the best steward it could have and as good a friend as their is.

It's time to go home. My friend is waiting for me to go hiking.

The Life Before this One, Tampa

We stayed at the Hilton and ask people where the mixer of sorts was Tuesday evening. They said at Tropicana Field where the Rays play six or eight blocks away. As we'd run across soccer people on the way over I noticed a few things. I was about the only one with a hat on, only one with boots, and the only one with a canteen.

We got to the Rays stadium and they said the mixer was at the Hilton. Somebody calls somebody and a Uber guy shows up and takes us to the Hilton who says the mixer is across the street at the Tampa Bay Rowdies soccer stadium so we walk over there and run into Chuck the guy who's running the whole show and use to work for us at Let's Play. We walk into the stadium and I start looking for people I know not really expecting to find anyone. It's been 18 years since I worked inside Let's Play. I find several.

The Life Before This One Called Me

Earlier this year I got a call from the life before this one. They ssaid I had been inducted into the Indoor Soccer Hall of Fame. I didn't know there was one. Would I come to the convention in Tampa and attend the ceremony? I emailed Heather and said look what I got. I don't really want to leave here. She said "Dad we're going to have so much fun." The flight from Moab, four hours late was on Contour Airlines, to Phoenix, where Heather would meet me for the rest of the journey. Contour said we'd me leaving at 7pm but we were still on the ground at 7pm. At some point we lifted off. As I was getting on the plane I saw this sign.

In the past when I parked at the airport but not for quite a few years, it always had said short term parking on one side of the sign and long term on the other side. This had me a little nervous. Scan, what the hell is that. A text will take me the whole flight. Heather knew I wouldn't do well in the real world so she had the whole trip planned out and she tried to speak my language. When I got off the flight in Phoenix, Heather called me and she didn't say go this gate or that one she said "Hike toward the sun." Then when we found each other she said "Follow me we got to catch our flight to Dallas."Then on the hike to the next gate she was calling people saying "I found him."In time we got to Tampa.

Heather rented a truck so I'd feel a little closer to home. Ir wasn't a Ford but once I spray painted Ford on it I felt better. Heather wanted to buy some food for our time here so we went to Trader Joe's which had a bunch of young employees running around appearing not to do anything. I couldn't find a single thing I recognized as food.

The Cactus are Blooming

The Life Before This One

I had a large hotel I bought at foreclosure in San Diego from Mitsui Bank. One day at Villas Chapultepec I interviewed a woman to be the marketing director. I had previously gone around to the pro teams, Padres, Chargers, and San Diego Sockers and told them I knew it would take me two or three years to fill the place up so in the meantime if they wanted to impress someone they could put them up at Villas Chapultepec. The Padres used me, the Chargers used me, the Sockers abused me. I hired Shari and she said she saw a lot of the Socker's players on the property. She asked if I knew her dad who workd with the Sockers and I did not. One day Russ came to pick her up after work. We talked, found out we both grew up in Salt Lake City, not too far from each other, and about the same age. We became friends and one day we went around and he showed me some skating rinks he had in San Diego and on weekends he would roll turf out and run indoor soccer leagues.

In time, since we both had daughters we spoke of girls in some states like Utah weren't getting college scholarships. They could only play when weather permitted while girls in Florida, Texas, and California were getting all the scholorships and the talent gap was obvious since they played year round. We found a piece of dirt in El Cajon by the airport and speedway, rented it, built a field and started running indoor soccer. We put up a second location in San Diego and another at an abandoned ice skating rink in Salt Lake City. After a year or two Russ said he had cancer so I bought him out and brought a few more people in as partners. Then it became my life.

I went on the road for years looking for locations for new facilities bur we weren't going to rent anymore. We own the location or we don't do the deal. Tucson, Midland, Five in Salt Lake, three in Denver, Colorado Springs, Boise, Wichita, OKC......I slept in the buildings, in the bleachers, on the desk. whatever worked. I was working 100 hour weeks for years and years. It would take a couple years to get profitable but by year five at the latest we had gotten all our money back and were making $100,000 plus a year, sometimes up to $1,000,000 a year. Plus, our real estate was going up. At first I would drive into a town like Houston, map it out, make my route all right hand turns so I didn't have to wait for stop lights. I spent 13 days and drove every street, every block. The owner of the pro team had ask me to find a facility so they could practice as they were currently in the garage of the Astro Dome and that garage had poles. Imagine playing soccer or hockey with poles in the middle of the arena. After 13 days I couldn't find a single building I liked.

I called the owner of the team and told him the bad news. He ask me to come visit. I went up to the top maybe 14th floor and we talked. He ask why we don't just build one. I told him I didn't have the experience. He said he did. He had built the building we were in. I would find the dirt and design it. He would contact his vendors and ask them to build it for cost and he would sell it to me for cost but he got to practice for free. Now I was dangerious. I could buy used buildings, build new buildings, and take over existing ones owned by others. Plus I now knew what everything cost. When I went to Austin next the builder there said concrete was five bucks a foot, but I new it was three bucks. I built locations for hundreds of thousands of dollars less then the appraisal would come in. I would pull into town and if I was going to have a competitor I'd spend a few days in their bleachers watching games trying to decide how much work it was going to be to run them out of business. Sometimes I'd offer to merge but it was really a purchase. Sometimes I would just build and outwork them until they were gone.

Haydukers

Three more Haydukers came through and I was so busy I've lost their trail names. Probably be the last three until fall. Part of the Hayduke goes through the Grand Canyon and it gets unbearably hot if you're not through there by start of summer. For hear we move into the 90's next week.